This week Gov. Rick Scott and the Florida Cabinet agreed to spent $9.8 million to purchase a 6,071-acre conservation easement in portions of Hardee and Polk counties to protect another part of a regional habitat corridor in the Peace River Basin.

The property owned by Crews Groves contains 3,826 acres of uplands and 2,245 acres of wetlands around Old Town Creek, which flows toward Charlie Creek, a tributary of the Peace River.

The property contains cutthroat grass, gopher tortoises, pygmy fringe tree and Florida scrub lizard.

It is adjacent or near to existing public and private conservation lands, including The Nature Conservancy’s Saddle Blanket Scrub.

The steady rain this month has finally raised the level and flow in the Upper Peace River to the point where it may be navigable again, according to provisional figures posted on the USGS Realtime Streamflow site.

It’s a good idea to check conditions downstream for obstructions.

In other paddling news, the County Commission is scheduled to take action Tuesday to ban parking at the Reedy/Livingston Creek bridge on Rucks Dairy Road in Lake Wales Ridge State Forest’s Arbuckle Unit.

There will continue to be legal parking nearby.

If you want to learn more about how to use water wisely head to Polk City Saturday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Donald Bronson Center, 124 Bronson Trail.

It’s perhaps fitting to have a Water Wise Expo in Polk City, since it lies in the Green Swamp, Central Florida’s Liquid Heart, the high point in the Floridan aquifer.

The free expo will feature information on water conservation, landscaping, hurricane preparedness, Zika and the Green Swamp itself.

Although there has been some rain lately and the county burn ban is being lifted, the drought is really not over.

At the heart of a federal lawsuit filed earlier this year against the developer of a couple of upscale Lakeland residential communities is whether living on reclaimed phosphate mines is hazardous to residents’ health because of radiation emissions.

The latest chapter in this debate played out this week at a public meeting in Lakeland in which residents were reassured by scientists and technical experts from the Florida Department of Health and the Florida Industrial & Phosphate Institute that the radiation hazard was practically non-existent.

The firm that filed the lawsuit and the plaintiffs in the case see things differently, relying on a paper trail stretching back to the 1970s that appears to demonstrate health and environmental officials raised concerns when these developments were being reclaimed and undergoing development review.

Interestingly, the main potential health issue that was raised at the time in press reports was the presence of an old city dump. That facility dated from the days when there was little regulation on what kinds of waste could be dumped and there was no thought of installing liners as there are in modern landfills to protect groundwater.

How this lawsuit will play out is a matter for the judge and the jury– if it gets that far–to decide.

Another lawsuit that made similar claims regarding developments in the Bartow area was filed in the state court system decades ago. It was dismissed.

If this suit is not dismissed, the implications are interesting.

There are many residential developments all over western Polk County where residents potentially face the same health threat—if one can be established—and could be the focus of additional lawsuits.

This has regional implications as well.

As mining continues to expand in other Florida counties, the potential effect on the health of residents living in future developments that would occur after mining and reclamation have occurred is an issue that is difficult to ignore until the claims in the current lawsuit are resolved.

There are related economic issues, including the impact of any verified claims on real estate values and, by extension, on the local tax roll. The impacts are unknown at this point.

Stay tuned.

The Florida Legislature’s unwillingness to implement the constitutional amendment Florida voters approved in 2014 to restart the Florida Forever program is becoming a local election issue.

The Ledger reports that retired judge Bob Doyel has announced he will run against incumbent Kelli Stargel for the Florida Senate.

Doyel specifically criticized Stargel and her fellow legislators for ignoring the will of the voters on Amendment 1 and other citizen mandates.

The election is not until next year when some legislators promise to move forward with Amendment 1—four years after the original referendum—but making this and other shortcomings of our so-called representatives a campaign issue cannot hurt the effort.

We didn’t break any records, but it was one of the driest springs on record in Polk, according to preliminary figures compiled by the National Weather Service.

Lakeland rainfall was 315 inches. The record was 2.28 inches in 1945. Normal rainfall is 9.92 inches.

Winter Haven rainfall was 1.92 inches. The record was 1.61 inches in 2000. Normal rainfall is 8.95 inches.

Bartow rainfall was 3.09 inches The record was 2.34 inches in 1908. Normal rainfall is 8.99 inches.

Polk and surrounding counties are still under a mandatory burn ban because of the wildfire danger and under increased watering restrictions because of the stress on water supplies.

If you thought plans for ramming new highways through preservation lands in southern Osceola County near the edge of Polk County were dead, think again.

The Central Florida Expressway Authority recently circulated a notice to local elected officials about plans to reopen the conceptual study of four projects that together would create an outer beltway miles south of State Road 417, the so-called Green Way (well, it was still green out there when the road was built).

The studies will be ongoing and will wrap up sometime next year.

The four proposed toll roads are:

Poinciana Parkway extension to I-4.

Southport Connection

Northeast Osceola Connection.

Osceola Expressway Extension.

Altogether, the network would run for 52 miles through some still largely undeveloped sections of lands near existing conservation lands. The main concerns are that the roads would cut through prime habitat for listed species and would make prescribed fire more difficult because of smoke management issues.

In addition, as we have seen from the changes along SR 417 over the years, these roads become development magnets that will attract more urban sprawl into the Everglades headwaters.